Occasional musings on a variety of things.

Individual Responsibility

So, rather than removing personal responsibility from the picture, the naturalistic worldview shows that holding people accountable is actually an essential part of the chain of causation that can shape good behavior. Furthermore, naturalism makes us more likely to be compassionate and effective in how we hold people accountable, since as we’ve seen it undercuts justifications for harsh punishment that ignore the causes of crime.

Good to see that someone wrote it, saving me the trouble of doing so. This article is about how the notion of personal responsibility can be incorporated sensibly into a deterministic (read: non-magical) view of human behaviour. [Later edit: sadly, this article has disappeared from the internet. Please leave a comment if you can find it.]